So I'm driving along and I notice a cop in the next lane over and a couple cars back. I'm doing 40 in a 35, so I lay off the gas. He changes lanes behind me, so we're cruising along for a couple of blocks. I'm letting *everyone* pass me. I'm doing 35 in a 35 and you can't do nothin' about it, Cop.

So we hit where I normally make a left. The light turns green and he flips on his lights. I say to my cow-orker "What the *fuck*?" Anyway, I cruise along in the right hand lane and pull into a parking lot. He pulls in behind me.

So, I turn the car off, toss the keys on the dash, roll down the window, and put my hands on the wheel.

He does the classic "stand behind the driver" move with his hand on his gun and asks how I'm doing. I don't play that game, so I speak loudly and straight ahead that I'm doing quite well. He comes over to me, ducks down and says that he pulled me over because of my registration. I point out my temporary permit while thinking what a loser this guy is. He asks me if I've paid fees on it and everything. I point out that I have a temporary permit. He asks me why it's not registered and I tell him that I'm waiting for a deed transfer. He asks me a few questions like whether I've had it smogged.

He asks me for my license. While I'm pulling it out, he leans in a bit more and asks where I work. He then asks "Sony?"

I didn't know this at the time -- but Sony does have offices around -- which leads me to a classic bit of 80's advice that I should have heeded. "Ray, if someone asks if you work at Sony, you say YES!"

So, I mentioned that I didn't and he says "Great. So what do you think of the PS3?"

...

20 minutes of discussing the PS3 afterwards, he gets back in his car and goes away.

As near as I can tell, I just got pulled me over by a cop to chat about the PS3. Your tax dollars at work.

I've been meaning to ask you about that. What's going on with your ticket?

Positive mostly. He said that he'd read that there was a bug it wasn't really backwards compatible. I explained that it was backwards compatible, but that some of the games weren't written according to Sony's specs.

We both agreed that the way they're releasing it sucks. Trying to make a scarcity isn't really fooling anyone. In 6 months to a year's time, there'll be no shortage of PS3s on the market and all this insanity about people selling preorder slips is indicative of the marketing job Sony's managed.

FC is actually pretty scary with the cops being ultra-responsive to things. You probably got flagged by obeying the speed limit exactly .. and he was trying to figure out if you were doing something odd :)